| | Today I went to an "open carry tea party". The main point of which being that many people want to be able to carry concealed handguns here in Wisconsin, but we are forbidden by law. However, there is no law against carrying a pistol openly in public. Also, a side point of the tea party was focused on the direction the country is turning and what we the people can do about it. Several politicians spoke, and all in all it was a good day and I can't think of much else that could have made it a better afternoon for me. I also have a few specific things I'd like to bring up about it, and I have sorted them into topics for your convenience 
You sure seem comfortable for being around something you say is so dangerous.
For a while someone I know and I were talking with someone who was against people carrying guns in public, and had many signs with (flawed, or otherwise misleading) statistics on them. He seemed very comfortable, considering he was around what he considered a public health hazard. We discussed several things with him, and he didn't seem like he even knew what certain firearm laws are or the fact that if the current laws are obeyed and enforced it is much better than banning or otherwise restricting the possession or even use in a worst case scenario of various sorts of firearms used in non-recreation applications.
The protester brought up the fact that his son has mental issues, and bought guns online. The man said that his son should never have been able to do that. I replied with a question. I asked him if he ever bought a gun online or even knew what it took. He did not, and I explained to him that to do it legally you have to do it through at least one gun dealer, and 2 in the case of interstate trade. He didn't know that, and didn't say if his son bought them legally or illegally. In reality though where I live, buying a firearm online is legally no different than going into a store and buying one. It can be cheaper and you have a wider selection, but that's about the only reason anyone would choose buying a gun over the internet versus actually handling it before buying it.
Anyway, I noticed one of the signs said something on the order of "10 kids die every day because of guns" and I asked one of the protester women what the definition of "kid" was. Being not a complete idiot, I know that "kid" means anyone up to 18 years old. So I was basically setting a tarp. She "shhed" me and told me she was listening to the speaker, I insisted on talking about it, (just like I insisted on talking to the zealot who said I was going to hell last year haha) she "shhed" me again and handed me a piece of her propaganda. Being the fair person that I am, I've been reading through it. I've found a lot of information that is simply flawed statistics. However, there is one part they use to try to discredit what the gun owning, Second Amendment supporting person thinks. Reading that, it actually is counter productive for them because it cites U.S. vs Miller (1939) (which I think is actually irrelevant to their cause, you can read about it here ) which they say protects the right to keep and bear arms "only if the arms in question are those that would be useful as part of a citizen militia" . So yes, thank you anti-gun protesting lady for distributing propaganda which tells me that any battle rifles, landmines, grenade launchers, f-16's and any other combat weapon I may or may not own is protected by the constitution of the United States of America.
It also said that the only US supreme court ruling in history that focused on the second amendment was in 1939. This is false, D.C. vs Heller (2008) focused around the second amendment, and whether or not it means that the citizens of the united states have the individual RIGHT to keep and bear arms. It was ruled that the people do, 5-4. Perhaps if these people quit living by their fears , they would come out of their caves and not print such blatantly false and misleading propaganda. Though when they try to tell the truth it doesn't work out for them, as I discussed in the previous paragraphs. haha.
Anti gun protesters and politicians really need to wake up and quit living in fear and running to their flawed statistics and not giving any credibility at all to the legitimate use of firearms for non-recreational activities.
Protests, Police, and the Media
Some of you may remember how last year around this time I went to St. Paul and Minneapolis with a friend to take a look around the outside of the Republican National Convention and whatever chaos may have arose, as well as seeing Rage Against the Machine later on that evening, and then whatever chaos arose after that. After today, my views on how these three elements tend to mingle have really been eye opening, as well as cementing the views I had from last year as well.
The Media tends to cause trouble wherever they may be. Not directly, but through their mere presence and the fact that they are typically exploited to further the agenda of whoever is protesting, and in the cases of the far left (at least in this country) this leads to stuff like people throwing bricks through windows and other extreme behavior on the basis of extreme behavior is what makes it onto the news.
Police tend to cause trouble because their presence is typically overboard in these situations, as well as making people uneasy. Also, certain sorts of people make bad police because of the fact that they lack a thing they were supposed to have learned called "discretion" and some of them just plain seem to enjoy being an ego maniac. Not that they are all that way, I mean I've met some really nice police. It just depends. In peaceful protests (regardless of what you may have heard, a group of people can assemble and talk politics while carrying loaded guns without anyone dieing. At least here in America.) their presence draws the media in, which we've already discussed is a problem.
Media Bias
What Bias? :-O No, I'm kidding. I know they are biased. Seeing it first hand today really made me mad. I have a friend who was there, she has 5 kids who were there as well, she was carrying a gun on her leg and she was interviewed by a news crew. They tried to bait her into saying something like "its all Obama's fault" or anything else to make her look ignorant. She just told the truth and how she felt. She didn't make it on the news however, except for a very small sound bite..
The 1 protester that was there most of the time (most of them left after the initial news crew video taping, hence the reason media causes problems) got A LOT more airtime on the news than anyone who was supporting the causes the tea party was for, and he was interviewed for less time than my friend was, and all he really did was puke up slogans. There are still people who cant figure out why there are some of us who think the mainstream media has a bias. I know even Fox News isn't unbiased (I believe that honor goes to The Onion) but they do a much better job than ABC does for sure.
My back and my pistol made it on the news! I'm glad they got me from my best side.
I'm about done...
...living my life the way I have been for far too long. Life is too short to waste it on things that don't matter. In the past month a good friend of mine has died in a car accident and a young person I know had a heart attack. Today I invited quite a few people who didn't come for what I saw as unimportant reasons. In reality I'm sure a lot of it was fear based, though some of them did have legitimate excuses for why they couldn't make it.
One thing I did agree with the protester guy about (there were only 2 there that I knew of 1 guy and 1 woman... haha) is that he made a point of saying at least he wasn't sitting on his couch watching football this afternoon like a bunch of his friends that had the same mindset. I needless to say told him I agreed with him on that, and I knew a lot of people who think like I do on the gun issues who were also doing mundane things like watching football.
Anyway, I'm going to start asking myself what actually matters. My life is too precious to spend "watching football" when I could be doing something that would make better use of my life. Not to say I won't have fun, I'll have a lot of that too. I'm just not going to push aside things that really matter so i can do something that i have no control over and that probably wont matter in another week. Catch my drift? I think I have a good start on this already for quite a while now actually, woo hoo!
What actually matters? A persons soul and where it goes, the people in my life in general and how I treat others, living my life right, what I do to make my country a decent place while I'm here, and for those that are here after I'm gone. Anything else is just icing on the cake of my life.
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| | Posted 10/18/2009 2:52 AM - 10 Views - 0 eProps - 0 comments
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